


Skylight

by baph0meat, marinarin



Series: nervous system [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: First Impressions, M/M, Pre-Relationship, sasori hasn't yet earned the honorific 'danna' and deidara hasn't earned uhhh anything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 05:23:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16235033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baph0meat/pseuds/baph0meat, https://archiveofourown.org/users/marinarin/pseuds/marinarin
Summary: "I’myourbrat now. And I’m your responsibility. Pein said so.”“Pein” has already become Deidara's new favorite word; it opens doors, and sometimes slams them in people’s faces, and it’s easy to wave around. His voice slips into the demure formality of an intern on their first day. “So please take me into your care.”-----deidara's been in the akatsuki for two weeks. he's spent the majority of that time getting on sasori's nerves; it's not until now that he starts to pique his interest, instead.





	Skylight

**Author's Note:**

> this, as the rest of the pieces in this series, is adapted from rps between myself and marinarin; i write deidara's pov, and she writes sasori's! the divisions between pov switches have been maintained to make the work easier to read.

The establishment of an avoidant perimeter around Sasori’s person, based on nothing more than sheer terror, didn’t take long. He’s pleased with the manner in which his position has fallen within the organization. Rumor feeds rumor particularly quickly within the criminal sphere. From the time he joins his name is known and associated with slaughter. He’s left alone, kept at arm’s length. After a string of particularly successful missions, his place in the hierarchy settles. It takes root. He takes full advantage of privileges, but there is something he has yet to perfect. The noise of Hiruko’s tail curling impatiently fills the hallways as he makes his way into the depths, to his chambers. If there is anything that remains unfinished business, it's the proper setup for his craft.

 _Insufficient_ , he thinks, as soon as he leaves the armored shell behind. Glass eyes take in the fine layer of dust travelling through the air, humidity and filth sticking to everything he’s kept immaculate. No use for careful handling in such an environment. It is, at best, precarious storage. Far below what he'd consider an appropriate space for his work, but enough for repair. He traces the outline of his instruments - also a far cry from the collection amassed in different caves scattered across Suna. He thinks frequently of going back for his possessions, but has not yet earned the right of running such high risk. Frustration has begun to pool into rage. For months, now, he’s watched from the shadows as mediocre new members come and go, amassing his disappointment. Death for desertion, for treason, for mindless arguments with those who have half a mind to tolerate it. For blatant inadequacy. As far as he’s concerned, only a handful have earned his respect. Even less have his full consideration as figures of authority. His fingertips travel slowly over a sharpened scalpel as he thinks about his options. The leeway he’s been given to act freely is limited and can run out quickly, but so can his patience.  

***

There's the sound of shearing rock, far off.

It’s been two weeks. Deidara will admit it took a solid week to calm down, to reel himself in, to stop spitting and biting and anyone who spoke to him - but he's all smiles now. What else can he do? He’s outclassed. The reality of the situation has settled in, and it’s grim - the checklist of people who would have to die before he could attempt escape is already steep, and he doesn't even have all the information yet.

 _Zetsu, first of all,_ he thinks, running his palm over the damp wall - he tastes clay and silica, but nothing of a grade he can use. There are veins of pyrite deeper in the cave system, he knows, but he hasn't gotten to really explore them. If the traces of limestone up here continue deeper in the earth, the pyrite’s probably useless for combustion, and -

He pauses to feel for vibrations, snapping himself out of his line of thought and reorienting himself. It's useless to think about. He’s a demolitionist - there's no way for him to _subtly_ investigate the cave’s structure and resources, especially not when he’s just arrived. He might as well just tug on Pein’s sleeve and ask for a blueprint of easily detonated support beams.

The screech and rumble of parting rock comes to a final crescendo, and Deidara’s head pops up from the floor of Sasori’s workshop.

“Oh, shit, I thought I was coming up low.” He makes a few hand seals, loose and distracted, and the stone he's standing on bubbles up like water. Beside him, a massive pallet of clay creaks as it settles, lifted as if on a trap door, and he flops back on it so he can crane his neck to observe the cavern. “Aaaah. High ceilings. _That’s_ nice.”

When he spots Sasori, he pushes off the pallet and runs an obstacle course through the space - over Hiruko’s back, under a rack of drying skins, popping up at the smaller man’s side with a grin. “Hey, I didn't know you were down here! Pein gave me instructions. Said all my stuff has to go in here.” He’s lapsed into using _oira_ \- it's I’m-just-a-humble-craftsman-from-Iwagakure contrived, and the country bumpkin humility of it isn't reflected anywhere in his tone. “So you'll have to move some stuff, I think.”

***

The limited range of expression that his features allow is sufficient to produce an irritated glare. He’d forgotten. _No_ , he thinks. He’d chosen to _purposefully_ avoid retaining any kind of information about this exhausting character from the day he was brought in. This walking accident, dragged to his self-imposed fate practically kicking and screaming. The picture of a prideful stupidity only sustainable in youth - displaying everything that he abhorred. So far he’d been successful in ignoring his existence. To his dismay, it seems incompetent leadership has other plans.  

His stare goes beyond meeting the other’s gaze and is fixed on fulminating any and all traces of this absurd entitlement. His wrist moves in a finite gesture. Hiruko’s tail rattles. The makeshift pallet, incomplete, disregarded and useless - crumbles.

“For reasons that escape me you’ve been given the luxury of survival.” He speaks, fingers bending slow in the air before returning to inhuman stillness. “Regardless of what those may be, you are not in a position to push your luck.”

Sasori turns away, dismissive of whatever words are next to drop from the other’s mouth like ungraceful debris. He can barely make out what he’s saying. “You’ll take as much space as I choose to give you, nothing more.”

***

When Hiruko’s tail flashes towards the pallet, there's a split second in which his hands flash up, on instinct, to shield himself; but besides the clattering of splintered wood, there's no other sound, no detonation, and he drops his arms with a high, airy laugh.

“ _Hiruko_ ,” he scolds, as if the puppet had done it of its own volition. He’s breathless and vibrating with nervous elation. It takes a few quick bounds for him to cross the space to the destroyed pallet, and his hands roam fitfully over the blocks of packaged clay now strewn across the floor in a ragged pile, tracing a deep, crisp gash that spans a few of them. Another hysterical giggle escapes him, sounding small in the dead air of the cavern.

His head turns towards Sasori again. “You know these are _explosives_ , right. God, but you've got a temper.” He throws a few stray packets back onto the pile. “Sure, this hasn't got any chakra in it -” here he holds up his hands and clacks his teeth together, demonstrating the methodology - “but with this quantity? It wouldn't have mattered. If Hiruko’s tail had sparked on the floor or something, you would've blown us all _straight_ to hell.”

Deidara doesn't sound evenly remotely concerned by the concept. In all honesty, there's a hint of wistfulness crossing his face. “But I wouldn't want my last work to be a collaboration,” he sighs. “If _you_ want to risk all your pieces exploding because you didn't give me enough room for my process, though, I guess that's on you. I can't argue, right, _sensei?”_

The title is mocking, and it’s the only honorific Deidara will give him. The sarcasm is about the most pointed and most frequent insubordination he can get away with, at this point.

***

The realization of his own oversight is enough proof - the walls are eating at him. This is no place for his craft to be realized. He’s incapable of articulating how much of a suffocating sensation it brings to him, despite having no breath left in him for the taking. And now _this._ The other is a lit match and his fuse is getting shorter. Sasori disconnects the second the other starts babbling about technicalities, forcing his thought process to come back to a level of composure  in which he recognises himself. _I shouldn’t have to be exposed to your incompetence_ , he filters.

“Do as you please.” He speaks, plainly indifferent tone. His eyes search the light as he holds an unfinished joint piece to inspect it, the delicate work rendered almost useless without proper illumination. More than once he’s been forced to repeat it. He makes up his mind. Orochimaru was able to keep hidden facilities for _months_. There is no reason he should have to endure this. “You’ll soon have this rotten mousehole all to yourself.”

***

Sasori’s change in attitude suits Deidara just fine, cryptic one-liners and all. He saunters back over to Hiruko and throws his arms around the puppet’s bowed neck. “You didn't _mean_ to, did you,” he coos conspiratorially. He peeks over Hiruko’s shoulder at Sasori, eyes lidded and swimming in humor. “The nasty man made you do it.”

He slips away from the puppet’s shoulders and makes his way across the room, stopping just over Sasori’s shoulder. “Anyway, while we _are_ sharing the space, is it really okay for you to just be….” He gestures ineffectively. “You know. _Out_ , like this.”

Sasori had revealed the truth about his separation from Hiruko at almost the first private opportunity he’d had; and while he cited it as too important for a partner to be oblivious to, he’d also emphasized the secrecy of the technique aggressively enough that it had somehow reached Deidara even through the haze of _What the fuck, why is he hot_ that dominates his memory of the conversation. Deidara’s hip juts as he thinks, beating a little rhythm in the air in 4/4 time. “I mean, there's no door. What do you do when people come down to talk to you?”

***

Sasori snaps an elbow mechanism out of place with enough force to drown out the other's amateur acting in its noise. He's not fond of the proximity and familiarity with which the other acts around him and his work. It is dangerously, stupidly out of line yet somehow there is a brazenness to it he cannot help but be curious about. _The ones who die young._

"No one comes down here." He says, a brief glance over his shoulder at the other. And its enough. Deidara's mere presence drains him, every facet of him always at an excruciatingly high volume. "No one but you has showcased their deathwish this insistently."

***

“People are gonna _start_ coming down here,” Deidara protests. “Hidan was already talking about helping me settle in.”

He reaches around Sasori’s side to the table. A glass eye disappears into his palm, then he makes a face and immediately spits it out again. “And I don’t have a deathwish. You were there. If I had a deathwish, I would’ve kept coming at Itachi.”

The last word is delivered like a curse. “I _could_ have blasted myself to bits, there. And him. And you.” He’s wrestling his tone back to conversational. “But I have stuff to do, so.”

***

"The zealot has weaknesses. As does the crow. Plenty. Me knowing this is enough to keep them off my grounds." Sasori produces a disapproving sound from the back of his throat, swatting at the air to get the other's hands off the materials. He doesn't mind the venom with which the Uchiha name is delivered, it's an appealing contrast to Deidara's routinely maniacal enthusiasm. Unconsciously or not, he begins to listen for it in the other's voice. "You _could_ have, you were prepared to. Most likely one of the reasons you're still here." His gaze holds the other's until it is clear it has gone through his skull. When he averts it, both his tone and cadence return to flatline. "As I've told you, you'll soon have this hole to yourself. Worry about your own security.”

***

“Whaaaat, they get _codenames_?” Deidara dodges Sasori’s halfhearted swats and manages to get into a pile of his schematics. “Why don’t I get a codename? Tell me my codename.”

He takes his time with the blueprints, staring them down the way he always does when confronted with art he wants to learn from. Sasori’s sketches are precise and thorough, and Deidara likes them. “Are you _really_ gonna let me drive you out of your workshop this easily, though? I’m not sure I’m willing to let you off like that, sensei.”

He tilts his head, hoping the statement is going to dig more eye contact out of Sasori. “Aren’t we partners? I go where you go. And _you’re_ supposed to be taking care of my security.”

***

There is a brief moment where Sasori considers the possibility of the other not being serious but it is completely overruled the second he faces the other again. To his disbelief, the demand is real. As are the fingertips smudging his charcoal. "They're _insults._ " He clarifies, firmly reaching out to snatch the line models from his grasp. Some inexplicable force restrains him - a manifestation of a mild desire to decipher what this unnervingly focused stare means. It doesn't stop a scoff from bubbling up the surface, an immediate response to the outrageous commentary. "Don't flatter yourself, I choose to leave. I'm not responsible for filling in this sugarcoated idea of partnership you've bought into." The wrist moves, invisible string tugging at the blueprints until they're his again. Enough of pleasantries. "We kill for a living, you brat. You're liable for your own death."

***

“What’s _my_ insult, then,” Deidara insists, undeterred - he’s distracted only momentarily by Sasori yanking the papers away. As Sasori continues, Deidara’s posture softens and slumps, leaving him smug and pleased against the workbench.

“Ah, there it is.” He rolls a dowel back and forth under his long fingers, his hair a coy veil over half his face. “Brat, huh? I don’t mind it.” He leans forward, unable and unwilling to hide the feline grin the insult’s invoked. “But, as I said, I’m _your_ brat now. And I’m your responsibility. Pein said so.”

“Pein” has already become his new favorite word; it opens doors, and sometimes slams them in people’s faces, and it’s easy to wave around. His voice slips into the demure formality of an intern on their first day. “So please take me into your care.”

***

"Stop begging." He spits out, near automatic. This grovelling is unsightly, even for him. In an effort to shake the unnerving words from his mind, he drowns them in bile."You're delusional if you believe I bend to him. I owe him nothing. I owe _you_ nothing." His gaze fixes too strongly and for far too long on a smile that clearly wants to be seen. He's stopped caring. He approaches. "Each sliver of respect and consideration from me has to be bled," he says, blueprints forgotten, the remnants of Hiruko's tail rattling on the floor like a ghost limb. The voice echoes in the cavern like a vulture's call. "Earn it."

***

Deidara’s smile is open and animalistic, all avid teeth and eager breath. “I can't remember the last time someone told me to _stop_ begging,” he laughs. He’s practically sitting on the workbench now, bent at the waist, and Sasori’s angry approach has put them eye-to-eye. He’s close enough that Deidara could kiss him, if he jolted forward, and if he were stupid enough to get himself killed over something so trivial. Instead he just leans forward even further, to lower his head below Sasori’s, tipping his face back to maintain eye contact. “But if you tell me how to bleed you, I’ll do it.”

***

Sasori looks down to meet Deidara’s eyes and his iron gaze is far less solid than what he'd planned initially. The few slivers of light that make it underground seem to betray him, attaching themselves to the curtain of hair always obscuring the other's face. He follows the lines down, ignores the gold, tries to, and is met with teeth instead. With _hunger_. Something unrecognizable engulfs the entirety of his resolve.

"Work," he says, but the tension he's reeling in makes it come out like a coarse whisper. "Improve. Surpass me."

Sasori moves away, forcibly removes himself from the space where this uninvited beast has swallowed him. As if that would force it to spit him out. He turns his back on the other.

"Don't _demand_. Don't boast about your abilities. Show me." He says, hands back on the working table. Back to what he knows. Sandpaper and blades and replaceable tools - himself among them. "You're nothing but a number until you've proven yourself here. To me and to everyone else."

***

“Hmmm. Tell you what.” Deidara pushes off the table and takes a few rocking steps to the side. “I’ll work, and I’ll improve, and I’ll surpass you.” He peeks over his shoulder, canting his head enough that his hair falls back, so he can lock Sasori into the sight of his scope. “But I’ll be demanding and boastful the whole time, too. It kind of comes with the package.”

He watches the tension in Sasori’s shoulders, smiles when he sees it extends all the way down the man’s compact form. “Hey, sensei? Speaking of. You told me something important about your techniques, so I’ll tell you something important about mine, okay?”

He turns on his heel, stretching his arms out in front of himself and cracking his knuckles - the mouths on his palms splay and drool, tongues loose and satisfied. “You should spend a lot less time looking at my face, and more looking at my hands.”

Then his hand snaps in front of his face, in a practiced, automated motion, a crisp earth release, and his one visible eye is wide and eager - “ _Katsu!”_

The ceiling of the cavern is so high that the first detonation sounds a far way off - and the others following it are even more so, as they move up through the layers of bedrock. There’s a cloud of dust, a rumbling, and then the first pieces of rubble begin to fall. Deidara laughs through the noise, delighted by the precision of his maneuver - the huge chunks of stone fall directly where he and Sasori had been standing moments before.

After the stone comes a shaft of sunlight, solid in the cloud of settling dust.

Deidara strolls over to the wreckage, shielding his eyes as he peers up to view his handiwork. There’s now a solid column bored from the ceiling of the cavern to the surface. When he looks back down at Sasori, it's with an ear-to-ear grin.

“Skylight,” he chirps. He nudges a few fallen rocks out of the way and clambers up to sit on the largest piece of rubble, swaying cheerfully. “You'll cover for me if Pein gets mad, right? It was a necessary renovation.” He sets his chin in his hand thoughtfully, eyes never leaving his partner. “I want to see you doing your best work, after all.”

***

It takes an extraordinary amount of self imposed restraint to keep his gaze away as the other speaks. It was foolish to believe something like this would evaporate into thin air at his wishing. At the third sentence, when Deidara's tone shifts from his routine rebellion into promise, he finds he can't stand his ground any longer.  

Sasori looks back at the other, his attention undisturbed by any thought. His stare sharpens while watching the seal formation, quick and seamless, and stays thin and focused at the first sounds of debris. The laughter, drowned together with the sharp noise of the cage falling apart, is nothing short of hypnotic. The beast's name is made apparent - curiosity.

"Progress," he allows himself, stepping into the bathed light. Sasori hadn’t seen the other produce something of this caliber yet. _Tasteless munition_ was all he had thought from the moment Deidara's combat strategy had been revealed. This is different. It has a level of charm he refuses to admit to. Not out loud. In the brightness he searches for the other's face. "Good work. Nothing Pein would understand, even when explained to him."

***

It’s easy to make Sasori look at him, and hard to get Sasori to praise him, and Deidara is elated by both. He slips off his rock perch, a giddy tangle of limbs, and practically skips to stand in front of him. “Good, yeah?” Deidara has to tilt his chin down to look Sasori in the eye - he already prefers looking up at him, but the flat stare Sasori always returns is good regardless of angle. Deidara isn’t _that_ picky. “I’m not known for subtlety,” he says, almost bashfully. “But when you’re a bomber, you end up having to moonlight as a saboteur, so.”

He turns his palm over, leaning in to let Sasori see, and a little winged beetle crawls out from between his teeth. Deidara’s sculptures never chase realism. It’s the essence of the creature, communicated in as few lines as possible, flat white with a porcelain finish. The model rattles its wings, alights from his finger, and explodes in a burst of light and dust a few meters above their heads.

“When I was by the pallet earlier, it was easy to pick up a little clay, since you ripped the packets.” Deidara leans backwards again, eyes fixed on the rough-hewn skylight. “It’s just as well, since I wouldn’t have been able to do something big enough to get all the way through without you noticing. But there’s pyrite veins in here, did you know that?”

One blue iris slides back down, pupil blown wide with self-satisfaction. He holds up his other hand, smeared with charcoal from the schematics. “Pyrite has a temper around carbon. Nasty enough that a little C2 clay, mixed with charcoal, could ride a lot longer on the exothermic reaction. I was _hoping_ that the veins would carry all the way to the surface - it’s nice to be right.”

***

"Subtlety does not suit you." Sasori speaks absentmindedly, his focus on the small insect-like figure. His neck sets in place with a slow tilt and a sharp rattle the moment he looks up to the small blast. Nothing of what the other is reciting interests him, yet he's retaining. Memorizing. Deidara's level of enthusiasm here is undistilled, and it should be grating. Like it has been. Instead, Sasori finds himself not only a sudden accomplice in property damage, but an encourager. A patron. "Useful, this terrain analysis of yours." He says, returning the other's gaze. "Cultivate it. You may not always have the luxury of a long-range position, nor time. Improvisation has a limit."

Glass eyes move without blinking, taking in the light. It's made apparent to him now that the size of the place may objectively be plenty. _Spatial awareness remains an issue_ , he tells himself, schematics of his ocular setup in mind. He's reluctant to explore his change of mind in any other capacity. "Take the left wing."

***

It’s victory after victory, as far as Deidara is concerned. The praise practically has him lightheaded - regardless of how quickly he's garnered it, he knows better than to think it’s easy to get. He was lucky this time.

Sasori’s invitation, curt though it may be, lights him up like a candle. Deidara goes back to happily swaying back and forth, unable to stop himself. “Yes, sensei. Whatever you say.” He turns towards the left half of the cavern, but then lingers, peering coyly over his shoulder. “It won't be too much. I travel light. I just need the airspace, you know?”

Then he’s back to sorting the pallet, setting his materials aside in the most responsible-looking way he can.

***

"I will hold you to your word." Sasori says, his cadence between sincerity and antagonism. He turns away, sparing one short glance at the manner in which Deidara begins to set up his space. _Unbecoming of him, this courteous docility_ , he thinks, realising its source is the same familiarity that irritates him. Keeping the other at bay will be tedious. Sasori picks up the wrist mechanism he'd given up on - holding it to the now overwhelming source of light. _Interesting, nonetheless._

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos appreciated as always! i've got art of this fic here: http://iraprince.tumblr.com/post/178859609369/


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